Riley Alone
by xenon3000
Summary: How Riley and her emotions handle a weekend being home alone for the first time.
1. Chapter 1

**Disclaimer: "Inside Out" belongs to The Walt Disney Company and Pixar Animation Studios.**

Tick. Tick. Tick. Tick.

That was the only sound Riley Andersen heard as she waited for the school bell to ring. She was in a study hall, last period of the day as a sophomore at Lowell High School. Today was a Friday. And not just any Friday.

She would have the whole small house to herself for the weekend. Her parents had left on Thursday to attend the funeral of one of their friends from Minnesota. This was the first time she would be home alone for a whole weekend.

Five minutes left.

She looked over the math assignment she had been working on. It was finished. Great. Now what to do with the remaining time?

Doodling. That was the answer. She started drawing herself as a hockey player. A professional hockey player. Specifically, she made herself one of the Chicago Blackhawks.

Four minutes left.

She had gotten the head and the chest area complete. But there was more work to be done. It looked more like a CPR dummy than an actual person. She needed to add arms and legs.

Three minutes left.

The arms were rendered. But they needed hands. She filled in the right hand, only to realize that while it had five fingers, the proportions were all wrong. Oh well.

Two minutes left.

Now to work on the left hand. The left hand looked a little better, but not much. She turned her attention to the feet. It would be better if she had a sheet of paper bigger than 8.5 by 11 inches. And without red and blue lines.

One minute.

Time to get ready to leave. She stuck her pencil back in her pocket, closed her binder, and stuffed it in her backpack.

Twenty seconds left.

Nineteen.

Eighteen.

Seventeen.

Sixteen.

Fifteen.

Fourteen.

Thirteen.

Twelve.

Eleven.

Ten.

Nine.

Eight.

Seven.

Six.

Five.

Four.

Three.

Two.

One.

End of the day.

Riley sprang up and took off.

Inside Riley's brain, Joy was in total control of Riley's body, steering Riley through the corridors towards the nearest exit like Jeff Gordon working his way to the front of the pack.

"Slow down, slow down!" cried Fear.

"What for, what for?" Joy asked in a manner mimicking Fear, but in a mocking fashion.

"We don't want to crash into anybody!" was Fear's answer.

"Calm down. We've never hit anybody in the halls before. We're going home, and we're going to have that home ALL TO OURSELVES!" Joy shrieked.

"How can you make that sound good when we've got nobody to talk to?" Sadness asked.

Riley had a long walk home, but it didn't feel like a long walk. She was elated. She was looking forward to being on her own for a few days.

She finished her other homework assignments. Then she made dinner while watching the local and national news on KGO-TV Channel 7. She had a little fun enjoying herself, surfing the internet, watching home movies, and looking through family photos.

But then things started to slow down. And Riley started to get bored.

**Stay tuned to see what Riley does next...**


	2. Chapter 2

"Great! We've got nothing to do!" Anger complained.

"I'm sure we can think of something to do if we think long enough and hard enough," Joy countered.

"What makes you so sure?" Sadness asked.

"Rome wasn't built in a day," Joy answered.

"Well, we're stuck here for the next two full days all by ourselves," Disgust reminded. "And we're not allowed to have any friends over. We have no chores to do, we've already seen all the videos and photos in the house, we've done Riley's homework..."

"Homework! That's it!" Joy shouted. "We can read ahead in the textbooks and see if we can figure out how to answer the questions Riley hasn't been assigned yet."

So Riley did. She made the most progress in her math textbook. She also read ahead in her other subjects, such as chemistry, history, and English literature.

She did that for the rest of the day until it was time to go to sleep.

Then came the morning. Riley continued to work further ahead in her subjects. In English literature and history, she got all the way to the end (there were only a few weeks left in the school year). She reached a point in her math textbook where she could go no further. She also encountered a stopping point in her chemistry textbook.

So it was Saturday, and she was stuck in the house. Her parents would not be home until Monday. She was allowed to leave the house to go to church at the Grace Cathedral on Sunday, and to head to school on Monday, obviously, but that was it.

Her emotions set about pondering what to do next.

"I guess we'll just have to sit around and wait for Sunday," Sadness moped.

"No we don't. We just need to look around and find other things to do," Joy answered. "Where haven't we looked yet?"

"We haven't been in Mom and Dad's rooms yet," Sadness responded.

"Let's see what's in there!" Joy said.

First stop was the office. She went through all the drawers, but was very careful to put everything back where she found it.

Next stop-her parents' bedroom. There she turned to her mother's closet. She saw some relatively ordinary clothes on hangers. Those clothes included some casual clothes such as T-shirts, jeans, and jean shorts. There were also a several nice blazers with matching skirts. One was red, the second was blue, the third was yellow, and the fourth was purple. But above the metal pipe where all the hangers hung from, there were additional items. One of those items looked like a big white box.

That box caught Riley's eye.

She stood on her tiptoes and brought the box down to where she could see it. Then she set the box on the bed and started to open it. When she opened it, what she saw made her gasp.

It was her mother's wedding dress.

And it was beautiful. She took it out of the box and laid it out flat on the bed.

"Let's try it on, let's try it on!" Joy cried out excitedly.

"It's not Riley's, it's her mother's!" Fear protested.

"What's the point?" Sadness asked. "What's the point in trying it on if we're not going out of the house with it?"

"We can take pictures," Joy suggested.

So Riley put on her mother's wedding dress. And then she took a picture of herself in it with her smartphone.

Looking at the picture, she realized she forgot something. She was still wearing her tennis shoes.

So she looked around to try and see if her mother had any white high heels around. She did. Another picture.

Was there a veil? If so, where was it?

She started looking around to see if she could find the veil. It wasn't in the box with the rest of the wedding dress. It wasn't in the closest either. Maybe it was in her mother's chest.

Then the doorbell rang.

**There is still more to come.**


	3. Chapter 3

"Who could that be?" Anger demanded.

"What do we do? What do we do?" Fear asked, speaking rapidly.

"Let's just answer it," Joy reassured.

"Please let this be a doorbell ditch, please let this be a doorbell ditch," Fear chanted.

Riley stood up. She walked towards the front door. Slowly. She sincerely hoped that when she reached the door, nobody would be there.

She placed her hand on the doorknob, then paused. Should I open it? Shouldn't I open it?

If only they had a peephole. She opened the door slowly...very slowly...just enough to stick her eye out. She did not want to open the door all the way and risk somebody seeing her in her mother's wedding dress.

"Hello?" she asked softly, hesitantly.

She looked to her left. She looked to her right.

Nobody was there.

Then she looked down. A package had arrived.

She closed the door, went back into her parent's bedroom, changed her clothes, went back outside and brought the package in.

For several minutes afterwards, she could hear her heart pounding. Loudly. That was way, way too close.

But it could have been worse.

Her parents could have caught her in the act. But they didn't. She didn't know how they would react and didn't want to find out.

Monday arrived, and her parents with it. They were both proud of Riley for keeping the house in working order and for staying on top of her schoolwork.

Her secret was safe. As soon as she deleted the pictures on her smartphone.

Tuesday came, and Riley decided to ask her mother something.

"Can I try on your wedding dress?" Riley asked her mother.

"No," her mother said firmly.

Riley turned around and walked away.

Her mother followed her and put her hand on Riley's shoulder. "Not until you have an engagement ring on your finger."

**The end.**


End file.
